


Siren in the Night

by Kimra



Category: The Witcher (TV)
Genre: Abduction, Drowning, Friends to Lovers, Huddling For Warmth, Kissing, M/M, Monsters, Sharing a Bed, Sirens
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-08
Updated: 2020-08-08
Packaged: 2021-03-06 05:29:07
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25708216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kimra/pseuds/Kimra
Summary: Geralt wakes to Jaskier gone in the night and makes chase.
Relationships: Geralt z Rivii | Geralt of Rivia/Jaskier | Dandelion
Comments: 20
Kudos: 286
Collections: Battleship 2020, Battleship 2020 - Ocean Witch, Battleship 2020 - Yellow Team





	Siren in the Night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [nan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/nan/gifts).



Geralt wakes and something is immediately off. It feels, for lack of a better description, like Jaskier is absent. Geralt could not say exactly what it is that defines his presence until now, when it’s missing. There is a gaping hole where Jaskier should be breathing, an absence where his occasional snores should intrude.

Geralt rolls out of his bedding onto a knee, one hand withdrawing his sword and listening for the tell-tale signs of a bard using the bathroom or seeking some other relief. He’s told Jaskier not to wander off at night, the dangers that lurk in shadows, but occasionally nature proves inconvenient.

When he can’t hear the bard Geralt scents the air, there’s a hint of dampness to it, riverweed, but nothing grossly out of the ordinary for their location. He gets to his feet, sword at the ready and kicks at Jaskier’s bedroll. There are no signs of a struggle, no signs of packing. Wherever he is, he went on his own two feet and with no supplies. Geralt could wait, but life has taught him that waiting is a fool’s game. Might as well wait for the axe to fall.

He finds Jaskier’s tracks in the forest mast, scuff marks of bare feet. The bard hasn’t even stopped to put his shoes on. Geralt dismisses any good situations and picks up the pace, the flat of his sword reflecting moonlight as he navigates the forests edges.

The smell of riverweed becomes thicker and mixed with blood, the sound of a song starts to becoming discernible, and Geralt’s running full tilt for the shore when he sees the outline of Jaskier slip under the water. Geralt wades into the rivers shore at a run, sheathes his sword across his back, takes a gulping breath and dives after the bard.

The song is loud in the water, deafening in warning, and Geralt grits his teeth and swims through the quagmire of opaque water until he breaks the shallows and catches sight of Jaskier’s bare feet kicking him into the water’s depths.

If he were above water Geralt would swear, instead he chases the bard and gains on him. He manages to wrap his hands around a fragile ankle and pull. Jaskier’s momentum stalls and Geralt propels himself up to his side. Geralt gets an arm around the other man’s chest just as he starts to fight. The siren’s song pounds against Geralt’s ear drums, makes them throb, Jaskier’s arms try to push him off so he can follow, and Geralt deals with it, holds on, and strikes out for the surface and shore.

He’s not halfway back up, his calves burning as he kicks up and up, when Jaskier’s struggles become something else. Geralt gets ready to redouble his efforts, when he realises that Jaskier is drowning. An instinct stronger than a monster’s lure has him holding his breath, but his face is changing colour, lips sealed tight even while it’s clear he’s still under the thrall. The surface is too far, the siren is too present, and Jaskier’s life hangs in the balance.

Geralt seals their lips together, clamps down on the other man’s nose and pushes air into Jaskier’s lung from his own. One breath to another because the air in his lungs is nothing to losing the bard. It’s practical, necessary. But Geralt knows it’s more than he’ll allow himself ever again. He releases Jaskier’s mouth, his own lungs tight with strain and emotion, and kicks them up and up until they breach the surface.

Jaskier gasps. Geralt does a more controlled pant and holds tight to the man.

“I’m here,” Jaskier acknowledges backlit by the moon in the sky, “wherever here is,” Jaskier looks at him with his big curious eyes, and there is absolute trust there, trust Geralt wishes he had the strength to crush.

“Land,” Geralt instructs, and Jaskier doesn’t need to be told twice. Which is good because as the bard starts for the sore Geralt feels the curl of webbed fingers around his ankle. “Fuck,” he manages to gasp out, and he sees Jaskier look back as Geralt is pulled back into the depths. Geralt thinks, ‘Don’t you bloody dare,’ but he can’t say it without drowning so he thinks it angrily at the bard as the siren drags him down to her nest.

The descent is rapid, the siren is swift and furious and hungry. He won’t make as good at meal as Jaskier, too tough and old, but that doesn’t slow her down. Geralt can barely see the moonlight on the rivers surface when she’s drawn him down all the way, but that’s a problem for later. First, he has to deal with the siren. She sinks sharp fingers into him and tries to bite him with rows of razor-sharp teeth.

Geralt punches her in the face, dazes her long enough to reach back and withdraw his sword. His lungs start to hurt, he has scant time before he passes out, breathes in water, and she eats what’s left of him, so he swings wild, but the water’s resistance weighs the attack down. It hits her, but it doesn’t do enough damage as crimson blood spills through the water. She rakes her fingers down his arm in retaliation. He adjusts his attack and stabs forward. The tip of the blade slides into her scaly chest and out the other side. She shrieks, gills flaring.

He has two choices, he can finish the job or survive. He rips his sword out and kicks off her shocked body to get to air as fast as he can. She might die, she might not, it’s a fatal wound in good circumstances but things have survived worse. He’s survived worse. But his lungs feel like their expanding with nowhere to go, and his chest feels like it might explode, and he’s fighting the need to breathe when there’s nothing but murky river water around him. He pushes, reaching up and up, and hopes Jaskier hasn’t done anything stupid.

When he breaches the surface he’s closer to shore than he expects and Jaskier, the fool, stumbles into the shallows to draw him out, shouting like a lunatic, and fretting over blood, of all things.

Geralt pushes him away and coughs up bile, then breathes in deep though his nose and out again until his body calms down. He leans against the hilt of his sword, the tip dug irreverently into the muddy bank until he can stand on his own.

Jaskier steps back from him, big eyed and awed like he always is, but something else as well. Geralt wipes his mouth with the heel of his palm and grumbles, “Let’s go.”

Jaskier nods, wraps his arms around himself and leads the way until he realises he doesn’t know the way. “You know,” he says with a rattle to his teeth and follows Geralt’s dark frame, “I don’t even remember waking up.”

“What’s the last thing you remember?” Geralt asks to keep him talking. The night air is cold, it’s late autumn, and they are both soaked to the bone. Geralt will be fine, but Jaskier's showing more and more signs of the cold setting in. It’s a problem they’ll have to deal with quickly.

“You pretending you don’t like my music, while I played that song you like about the Maid of Villaroy.”

It’s a good memory, Geralt reasons, knowing it may have been Jaskier’s last keeps him from denying that he did like the music. Jaskier has a night voice that lulls even the most weary to relax, and Geralt has listened to countless hours of it over the firelight. There are sirens, Geralt thinks, and then there is Jaskier who could trick you into worse things than a watery grave if given a chance.

When they reach the camp the fire has started to die so Geralt drags a large dried out branch onto it to try and warm the hallow. Jaskier watches, the shiver in his limbs increasing.

“Strip,” Geralt orders, as he does the same. Jaskier follows with clumsy fingers, trying to get fastenings undone when the coordination is gone. Geralt unashamed of his nudity steps over to help, the fire heating his back, and Jaskier’s eyes fixed on him. “You need to warm up,” Geralt explains feeling nervous suddenly. “Don’t take it personally,” he adds and regrets the words because they are a clear indication that Jaskier would pick up on if he were more in his right mind. But he’s been dosed by a siren’s song and is going into the early stages of hypothermia. Geralt gets away with the tell as he tugs the last pieces of clothes off his friend. Then he piles all their blankets into a single mound by the fire, and drags Jaskier into the nest. Their bodies drag against each other, and Geralt rubs warmth into Jaskier’s bear arms and back, not trusting himself to reach lower. It’s enough though, Jaskier warms against him, with the fire at their side, the blankets pulled up over them, and shared body warmth to get the human through the night.

Geralt luxuriates in the feel of skin on skin. Doesn’t think of the last time he was this close to another person, and lets himself enjoys it. Any improper thought he crushes before it can form, and instead he holds tight and feels the rise and fall of Jaskier’s chest while he listens for any more siren’s song.

Jaskier hums against him once his limbs have stopped shaking, his voice low and amused. “I know a song,” he tells Geralt without being asked.

“I’m told you know more than one,” Geralt replies when the silence drags out. He knows when he’s expected to participate in a conversation, usually he just doesn’t care.

“About sirens,” Jaskier murmurs, mouth close to Geralt’s throat. Geralt closes his eyes and recognises the signs, the evidence. Jaskier had been under thrall, but after surfacing he’d been in control again. Jaskier had woken up between drowning and surfacing and there’s only one thing that could have done it. One way to break a siren’s call.

“Shut up, Jaskier,” Geralt grumbles, a flush high on his cheeks that he’ll blame on the fire if anyone sees it.

“Okay,” Jaskier replies, but he wiggles up, skin rubbing against Geralt's, until he can press a kiss to Geralt’s parted lips. “Okay,” he agrees, looking down at Geralt searchingly.

Geralt presses his arm over his own eyes so that he doesn’t have to look, overwhelmed but a tiny kiss and the look in Jaskier’s eyes that says that tomorrow they’ll talk about everything Geralt doesn’t want to say today.

“It goes both ways,” Jaskier murmurs when he’s slinked back down to lie across Geralt’s chest.

“That’s not how a siren’s song works,” Geralt argues needlessly.

“No,” Jaskier agrees, “but it goes both ways.”

They fall into silence, Geralt breathing in time to the bard, and slowly, quietly Jaskier falls asleep. Geralt does not, listening for the silences in the night as he holds Jaskier safely in his arms. Tomorrow they’ll argue about what counts as a kiss, and Geralt will try very hard not to think about what counts as love.


End file.
